This past week, I took a trip with two friends down south and out east. The purpose of this trip was to look at colleges and get a feel for different cities. In 7 days, we went through 14 different states, and Washington D.C. We visited 8 different schools, and many major cities. And, in this short amount of time I learned different things about traveling and visiting unknown areas.
1) Stay away from red cars.
I would have to say this is our number one lesson learned. Twice, we had “stalkers” in red cars. Well, they weren’t really stalkers. The first set of guys, two males about our age, would get up to speed in the lane next to us and smirk at us. Then they would zoom off again in their red Cavalier, only to maintain our speed once again. We could not control our laughter, even after trying to distract ourselves with music and talking. Eventually, and to our relief, they took an exit and we continued on the freeway.
Our second set of “stalkers” came on our way home. They, too, were driving a red car. And they would get up to speed in the lane next to us and not only smirk but motion for us to pull over. “They’ve gotta be out of their minds if they think we’re gunna pull over,” my friend spoke for the three of us. This time, it wasn’t as simple as departing ways, though. We were extremely low on gas and needed to stop. We tried losing them and ignoring them for a while. But, finally we had to take an exit and get gas. Needless to say, they followed us. So, here are three teenage girls, alone, with two guys wanting to flirt and who knows what else. So, we continue on our travels, not stopping for gas, hoping by chance they’ll get the idea. I think they realized they were freaking us out and we weren’t the type of girls to pull over and start flirting. We got back on the interstate and I got up to a high speed and got far ahead of them. Well, obviously our gas tank didn’t fill itself, so after driving a few miles and losing them (or so we thought) we decided to pull over. Unfortunately as I glanced in my rearview, there they were, close behind. They didn’t look like the type to have guns or want to hurt us or anything, so, risking it, we pulled over. To our relief, they didn’t follow us. They seemed like nice guys and I think realized the wise thing to do would be keep driving, even though they had perfect opportunity to pull over after us. We were pleasantly surprised and continued on our way home.
2) Figure out where you’re going before you get horribly lost in Pennsylvania.
While on an interstate in Pennsylvania going about 80 MPH, we suddenly came to a stoplight. We kept going straight, hoping it would get us back to the highway and up to speed again. We ended up getting lost in the ghetto of Pennsylvania and not being able to get out for over an hour. We took roads that we thought were exits, but in reality were extremely sharp corners, that almost sent us off the road.
Finally, after finding some civilization and filling up on needed gas, we found some sort of road that took us back to some major highway. Unfortunately we lost a lot of time doing this, even though I found it humourous.
3) Turn your hearing aid up a few notches when talking to foreigners.
I got tired of saying “pardon” and “excuse me” to people at hotels, stores, restaurants and such. People should have a standardized English test they must take before being hired. First of all, some people have such a heavy accent, you could barely understand them if they shouted. Second of all, they don’t know English. I felt like I was in a different country. I had to motion and use different words to explain camera to one guy, to no avail. Eventually, I just got out my camera and showed it to him. He finally understood. And third, even if they could speak good English with no accent, some people mumbled so much that we couldn’t understand them for the life of us.
4) Shop on priceline.com for best hotel rates.
My friend found amazing deals on priceline.com. We stayed at hotels two of the nights on our trip, and both were about ¼ the cost of what one would normally pay for the room. Of course, she brilliantly told them there were two people, not the real three, because some certain charge would have been applied. But, we got huge, fancy hotels for under $60.00 each, per night. One had valet service and bell-boys.
5) Give pennies to toll booth attendants.
Being the dorky teenager that I am, I thought it would be funny to pay the toll attendants in pennies, instead of quarters, dimes and nickels. So, while in Chicago, I found a bank and exchanged two dollar bills for 4 rolls of pennies. Unfortunately, we only went through two toll plazas on the way home from Chicago. The first lady graciously believed us when we told her how much we gave her. The second gentleman asked my friend how much it was. She firmly responded “75 cents” which it really was. He again, in a firm tone asked, “How much?” She replied the same as she previously had and he said, in a gruff voice, “Okay.” It was entertaining for the time being.
6) Eat lots of chicken.
Chicken must give us energy or something. On our trip, we ate chicken strips, chicken sandwiches, fried chicken, cajun chicken, chicken selects, chicken alfredo, popcorn chicken, chicken salad, chicken burritos and chicken quesadillas. Remember, this was all in the course of a week. Most of my main meals were chicken. That must have been what I was craving, and it sustained me until the last night of the trip.
7) Stay awake while driving.
After getting an average of four hours sleep a night, driving was a more difficult task than usual, especially toward the end of the trip. As one friend slept in the back seat, the other sat in the front passenger telling me pointless stories of her past trying to help me stay awake and alert. I rolled the window down a few inches and turned the heat off. I chewed gum and drank a huge cup of cappuccino. I tried turning the music way up, and then tried turning it off. I turned the lights in the car on.
My friend in the back seat woke up and asked why the light was on and why on earth the window was down. I told her I was trying to stay awake. She told me to pull over so she could drive. I did, and she ran the second red light of our trip a couple hours later. She needed more sleep as well. So, my advice: drink a lot of caffeine when driving tired and make sure it kicks in!
We made it home safe and sound at about 1:30 Wednesday morning. I journaled pages and pages about our trip and would have to say that this is the most fun I’ve had in a long time. If you take nothing more away from this article just remember this while traveling: stay away from red cars!
~Sarah
